Thanks for writing this.  I read that article in the NYT and realized that to a certain degree, it does in fact represent my experience.  I am a 47 year old mother of six children.  I live in an affluent suburb of a major city and am constantly fighting internally that I need to be a size 6, have no wrinkles, no tummy, perfectly manicured nails, long straight hair and stylish clothes.  I am surrounded by many lovely women at our parish & Catholic school who dress years younger, regularly get botox, spend a small fortune and ridiculous amounts of time on exercising - many of these women have personal trainers too.  My dh and I laugh about the compliment I receive the most “you don’t look like you have six kids” often exclaimed with great approval.  What does that mean to highly praised for NOT looking like you’ve given birth six times?  I assume it means that often people assume that if you have more than 2 kids you’ll look terrible—but can’t there be a middle ground?  can’t we be healthy and comfortable in a size 12?  can’t I finally rest in the middle aged body I am?

“We have contraception to thank for this.”
Hilarious.
I think we have sex to thank for this.
I think we have easier divorce to thank for this.
I think we have never-married mothers to thank for this.
I think we have the advertising community to thank for this.
Blaming contraception is ridiculous.

“But before the widespread acceptance of contraception, there was more of an emphasis on being beautiful than being sexy.”
And beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  So what?
I think you’ve come up with yet another very silly piece of fluff.
The Protestant churches allowed contraception in the 1930s.
From Wiki:
“Contraception was also officially disallowed by non-Catholic Christians until 1930 when the Anglican Communion changed its policy. Soon after, most Protestant groups came to accept the use of modern contraceptives as a matter of Biblically allowable freedom of conscience.”

“Back in 1968 Pope Paul VI”
was about 38 years too late as usual.
“25 years ago [he] “prophesied” that marriages and society would suffer if the use of contraception became widespread. Now the vast majority of spouses, as well as those who are unmarried, use some form of contraception.”
Perhaps he should have “prophesied” that making divorce easier would cause “marriages and society to suffer”.  Perhaps he should have foreseen that large numbers of couples would have children without being married.  It does seem that marriage and society have changed in the 80 years since 1930.  Blaming contraception is really silly.

“The Pope realized that the Church’s teaching on contraception is designed to protect the good of conjugal love.”
He was entitled to his not-very-inerrant opinion 43 years ago.  And his teaching was obviously rejected by Catholics as well as everyone else.

“In contraceptive culture, ...”
Hilarious.  Change that to “in modern culture ...”.  Turn the clock back 43 or 80 years?

Today’s news.  World food production will need to double by 2050.  Malthus was correct of course, if premature.  Fortunately, for a couple of reasons, the Catholic Church is on the wrong side of history and the population will be smaller than it otherwise would have been.

I thought Jennifer’s article was pretty good.  Given that contraception is based on use of persons, it doesn’t surprise me that today’s women feel that they have to be judged by their cover.

Mike McCants says: “Hilarious.
I think we have sex to thank for this.
I think we have easier divorce to thank for this.
I think we have never-married mothers to thank for this.
I think we have the advertising community to thank for this.
Blaming contraception is ridiculous., etc “
All of which we have a contraceptive culture to thank for. You really don’t have an arguement.

Here is my argument:  correlation does not imply causation.
The attempt to blame certain problems of modern society on any one cause is ridiculous.

Well, on the plus side, the older you get, the more comfortable you are shrugging off the silliness. I honestly don’t think any but the most vain, shallow, spoiled seniors would give a moment’s thought to whether they are considered sexy or not. Do any of us personally know any seniors who are concerned about sexiness?  It sounds like a fad amongst the Hollywood set.

Mike McCants says:

“The attempt to blame certain problems of modern society on any one cause is ridiculous.”

I agree with you here, Mike, but I also think that the author’s observations are quite astute.  While correlation might not imply causation in an absolute sense, she certainly makes some fine points to demonstrate how the intentions and mindsets behind contraception give rise to feelings of insecurity many women today feel.

Oh, and Malthus’ has not shown to be correct and it is not yet evident that we are running out of food.  As for who is on the wrong side of history, we’ll just have to wait and see, I guess.

Mike McCants:

Jennifer Fulwiler seems to be a blogger in the area of
religion/Catholicism.  The only sort of
point that your argument might advance is
that she’s not going to be able to obtain a PhD in
Sociology with this entry. 

In her frame of reference, I think she’s allowed to say
“this situation exists.. Pope Paul claimed that this would
be a result of the denigration of Conjugal Love”.

Considering the rubbish one hears from many tenured Sociologists,
I’m not terribly troubled that Jennifer is not going to be
able to break into the field.

But let’s not forget the men who have been duped into thinking that Viagra is the source of all happiness. Men and women both have been fools for a sex-centric society, and yes, the biggest lie that led there is contraception. Once we started pretending that we could participate in consequence-free sex, the rest was fairly easy.

Go Erika Evans!

That is completely the right attitude to take!

In a July 29th 2005 press release, the World Health Organization declared that combined estrogen-progestogen Oral Contraceptives are carcinogenic to humans. Specifically, they said that “Use of OC’s increases risk of breast, cervix, and liver cancer.” The data was presented by a working group of 21 scientists from 8 countries convened by the cancer research agency of the WHO, the International Agency for Research on Cancer.

Companies that make birth control pills also have admitted a link between the drug and breast cancer. More recently, the journal of the Mayo Clinic (Mayo Clinic Proceedings) published an article entitled “Oral Contraceptive Use as a Risk Factor for Pre-menopausal Breast Cancer: A Meta-analysis.” It revealed that 21 of 23 studies that followed women who took the pill prior to having their first child showed an increased risk of breast cancer. The increase was especially steep among younger women. One of the authors, Chris Kahlenborn, M.D., stated, “Anyone who is prescribing oral contraceptives has a duty to tell women that 21 of 23 studies showed an increased risk.” He added, “As more information comes out, it’s going to be increasingly difficult to suppress [the documented evidence from medical studies]. There’s a growing sense that it’s really just a matter of time before the lid blows on this thing. . . . We will start seeing a new attitude towards the pill, and it will be fueled by lawsuits.”

Why does the Pill increase a woman’s odds of developing breast cancer? Chris Kahlenborn, M.D., explains: “Two of the most important types of hormones that control reproduction are estrogens and progestins. Birth Control Pills are made from synthetic estrogens and/or progestins. Experiments have shown that these hormones cause women’s breast cells to divide more rapidly, which makes them more easily affected by carcinogens - agents which cause cancer” check out A Consumer’s Guide to the Pill and Other Drugs by John B.Wilks, Pharm. M.P.S.

Do any of us personally know any seniors who are concerned about sexiness?

If not “sexiness” per se, I think we all know quite a few seniors who are concerned about aging, graying, etc.  And that sort of thing probably starts young.

You nailed it. Thank you for writing this

Thanks, Jennifer for the insightful and accurate blog.

The culture of death has many followers: those who contracept, sterilize, and abort societies into oblivion.

Take a look at the Japanese and Russian cultures, for example. Both of them cannot replace the citizenry for different reasons: the Russians because of fear, and the Japanese generally because of misguided selfishness. Both countries don’t have enough workers (one of the many effects of the culture of death).

Vladivostock has to import Chinese and Filipino workers to get work done. Japan has to do the same-but Japan has a different problem. They want the Phillipino workers to go home when the work is done, so they don’t change the Japanese culture. But many of the Philipinos like Japan and have come to stay, to the consternation of the contracepting Japanese women. Japanese culture is dissapearing, but they don’t want to have more children to replace themselves. Duh… without CHILDREN… you cannot have a future culture!

Great topic, Jennifer.

Jennifer - I really appreciate this post, as I appreciate all your posts on the subtle (or perhaps not-so-subtle) ways contraception shifts the value of women.

I think the first moment I began to realize just how much contraception warps a woman’s body image was shortly before I was married.

I had a friend tell me that I should have boudoir photos taken for my husband as a wedding gift. My first thought was, “Well, I’m giving him my actual self…Isn’t that better?”

But I guess what disturbed me more was that she then said, “It will make you feel so good about yourself - I felt so beautiful when I had my pictures taken for my husband.”

It was then I realized what a contraceptive culture and 6 years on The Pill had done to this woman. It took sexy lingerie photos for her to feel beautiful.

I didn’t know how to tell her that I felt beautiful just knowing a really good man loved me for who I was and wanted to marry me as soon as possible. And I couldn’t imagine anything more depressing than giving my husband a Photoshopped version of myself on our Wedding Day, rather than my actual self that God designed.

The whole thing just made me really sad and I’m so glad you take the time to discuss this often overlooked subject.

I love it when you write what I was thinking.

“Here is my argument:  correlation does not imply causation.”

Correlation also doesn’t mean that you can simply declare this and ignore the rest of the arguments. If someone showed a correlation between a drug and cancer, you might state that “correlation doesn’t prove causation,” but it also doesn’t mean you can just dismiss it. A truly scientific inquiry would examine WHY there is a correlation (A is correlated with B, is A causing B or B causing A or another item C causing B and A…pure coincidence is only ruled once the other three are ruled out). Correlation if anything gives a possibility for research.

There are very detailed sociological theories behind why contraception leads to the destruction of the family and the devaluation of women. This article touches on why, the devaluing and destruction of part of who the woman is so that she can be used as a sexual object without consequences.

The superstitious will regularly see a cause, and then imagine irrelevant effects. Then there are people who see an effect, and then imagine irrelevant causes. We call them Catholics.

My doctor put me on birth control pills to regulate my cycle since I was really suffering each month. And those periods were the worst on Saturdays and Sundays. This medicine is also combined with prescription pain pills. This meant that I was missing out on church. Not good when you’re also an Extraordinary Minster.
I can understand the church’s views on this method of birth control, but is there an exception for the reason that I listed above?

Paul Rimmer -

Care to come up with an alternative answer for why women are feeling increased pressure to look sexy?  Fulwiler certainly may be wrong. “Catholics” may be wrong.  But if we are then propose something else for us to believe.  You aren’t advancing any sort of dialogue or understanding of culture.

RE: Mary,

The church has always said that it’s OK to use medicine to cure a problem. Using synthetic estrogen to regulate a irregular cycle would therefore be just fine, because you are attempting to either a) fix a problem or b) regulate the pain/suffering associated with a non-fixable problem. Same reason why you can remove a uterus that has cancer - even though it sterilizes the woman.

With that said, birth control pills tend to just mask the actual problems. Often, for whatever problem a woman complains of, the doctors will simply hand her the pill and not look into the issue further. Complaints about PMS, irregular cycles, pain, etc, all get the same “treatment” of masking the symptoms with a class 1 carcinogen. What if it’s something that can be healed with a diet/exercise change? What if it’s a cist or cancer? I highly suggest you look into NaPro Technology or other treatments that work with a woman’s body to find out the cause of the problem and actually treat it - instead of just handing the woman a problem so she stops complaining.

“Correlation also doesn’t mean that you can simply declare this and ignore the rest of the arguments.”
Quite true.  But there was no argument in the first place and there are no “rest of the arguments”.
“Correlation if anything gives a possibility for research.”
Yes.  I suggest research into movies, TV, and pornography.  Research into “contraception” would be very difficult.  Of course this column is just a ridiculous opinion by Jennifer in a silly attempt to try to gain some “points” for a Catholic teaching that has been widely ignored even by Catholics for 80 years.
“There are very detailed sociological theories behind why contraception leads to the destruction of the family and the devaluation of women.”
And that is why Jennifer has links to some of those theories in her column, right?  Wait, I don’t see any such links.  I went looking and I found:
“Contraceptives made the sexual revolution possible.”
Perhaps this is true.  So what?  It’s 80 years too late to change the US into a theocracy that bans contraceptives.  So it’s quite pointless to claim this as a “cause” when there was never any reasonable “remedy” that would have prevented this might have “caused”.  And there is still the question of separating the use of contraceptives to prevent the spread of disease among non-married adults versus the use of contraceptives for family planning purposes.  There was never going to be a “solution” to this “problem”.  Jennifer is simply trying to score a “point”.

Mary -

This is more complex than you might think.  First of all, I would encourage you to find a doctor to look at possible solutions to your medical needs that won’t prescribe the pill.  The reason is that often the pill will only cure symptoms and won’t actually get to the root of the problem.  In other words, there might be a better solution to your medical needs than the pill is providing.

I’m not sure how old you are and whether or not conceiving is something you are thinking about, but going on the pill can cause more long term problems for some women.  Thus, finding a more natural solution might be of great benefit to you.

But you are in a different moral situation than those who would seek to use the pill in order to pursue supposed casual sex.  Your intention is not to avoid conceiving, but to help you with your medical problems.  Still, if you are sexually active, it is possible that using the pill is working as an abortifacient, which is problematic even though the intention is not present.

I would suggest talking to a faithful priest and talking to your doctor about finding more natural solutions to your medical problems.

I hope that helps.  God Bless.

Bryan,
I do not know if there really is much of an increased pressure. If there is, there may be many influences, such as global communication. I do not know what really causes this increased pressure, if there really is an increased pressure. It seems that you admit that you don’t know what the cause is. If that is true, why believe this contraception explanation? Why not simply admit that you don’t know, and start looking for what the cause may be? Jennifer isn’t as balanced or well-reasoned as you are; she has asserted with confidence that contraception has caused this pressure. In other words, she saw an effect, and imagined a cause that very likely has nothing to do with it.

It is true that if you’re not an attractive woman, that you are invisible. It’s that way in the work place as well. Men can age and still get great jobs and roles in Hollywood, but not if you’re a woman. Not being good looking can also prevent you from being hired. Never mind that you can work circles around the competition. It’s our appearance that matters. Unfortunately, our society does care about looks.

Mary, consider the possibility that God is inviting you to reconsider your role as Extraordinary (every week?) minister.

Why is it so evident that contraception has NOT caused the devaluation of women?

As far as I can tell the link is fairly clear. You have a class 1 carcinogen given to women so that their bodies are essentially broken and men can have sex with them without consequences. Sex no longer is about loving another (for if you loved them would you not want better than such a horrible drug?) and potentially creating a family with that person, but about sexual pleasure for yourself without the “consequences” of a family. And if the other person fails to be sexually pleasurable they are worthless.

What evidence is there that contraception has NO effect? If there was a correlation between cancer and some drug, would you not want the drug discontinued until you could prove it was NOT the drug causing the cancer?

Paul Rimmer:

“It seems that you admit that you don’t know what the cause is.”

I agree with Mike McCants that there probably isn’t only one cause.  I think pornography is certainly a huge cause of it in addition to a number of other factors.  But I do believe that Contraception could have something to do with it for the reasons that Fulwiler explains in her article.

If that is true, why believe this contraception explanation?

Because it makes sense.

Why not simply admit that you don’t know, and start looking for what the cause may be?

That is what Fulwiler has done.  That is what I am doing now. 

Jennifer isn’t as balanced or well-reasoned as you are; she has asserted with confidence that contraception has caused this pressure. In other words, she saw an effect, and imagined a cause that very likely has nothing to do with it.”

I don’t see how you can say it very likely has nothing to do with it.  Sure it might not, but writing off her explanation with such confidence is perhaps worse than accusing her of confidently stating her assertion.

I just feel like her comments are being written off for no good reason, and that is a shame.

Mike, welcome to the website. 

I think it is safe to say that most Catholics, at least most Catholics I know, understand causation and correlation at least in common sense terms.  Some of the world’s brightest scientists are Catholic, and in fact we did development the scientific method, should be evidence, in general, that Catholics are not afraid of science, in fact we welcome it.  Perhaps, Jennifer is not claiming a physical causation, but ideological causation.  Would it surprise you that people who treat themsevles as objects would also allow themselves to only find value with themselves in physical features?

Maybe I have missed it. I do not see anywhere in the article where Jennifer says that she doesn’t know for sure, and a few places where it seems as though she is saying that she does.

As far as I can tell from the article, along with McCants, I don’t see any reasons she is giving for her argument that contraception is involved. There are no real studies or experiments to determine this.

Such experiments would be very difficult to perform. I can imagine a long-term study that considers groups of people who were given standard sex education, versus groups of people who were given abstinence-only education, and we can see if one group has a higher use of plastic surgery later on in life than the other. The problem with this study is that wealth, social status, even religion, would have to be considered, and the results would have to be adjusted for these factors, or the experiment would have to be performed over a good statistical sample.

Thinking about it, any experiment would have to measure one intangible, “contraceptive mentality” as the cause of another intangible, “pressure to sexualize” or some such conception (never labeled in the article, and referred to as “this”). It may be that no good experiment or study will be able to establish what Jennifer is talking about because maybe she’s not really talking about anything at all.

Before I read the article, I was not convinced that there is even this problem of pressure to sexualize. After reading the article, I am still unconvinced.

It is not that I am writing off her ideas for no good reason. There are many good reasons for writing off most of Jennifer’s ideas. One good thing about her writing is her style. She is very clear. She provides such clarity everyone can see that nothing’s there.

Lady Cygnus,

It seems clear to me.

You have a type 1 carcinogen, the Sun, which has been shining on people’s skin, and the sun exposure makes for tanned skin, which sets off a lifetime of obsession about looking beautiful.

Since the global average temperature has been increasing over the past years, and greenhouse gasses have been acting as a lens to focus sun rays on women all over the world, the problem has been intensifying!

Look at that! Global warming is the obvious cause of this increased obsession women have with their appearance! I’m sure Al Gore predicted this somewhere.

Atheists trolling an article on a Catholic website where atheism isn’t actually mentioned.  You have to ask yourself ... why?

As for these atheist trolls I say this: As Jennifer said on her Conversion Diary recently, sometimes it is OK to just let a person be - wrong.  We don’t have to accept every invitation we receive to an argument.

Whether or not Sophia Loren’s posing (when she should be resting) is correlative or causative, with respect to our contraceptive culture, is obviously an unknown.  And, I don’t think Mrs. Fulwiler was contending she knows that absolute certainty either.  Rather, she was highlighting Loren’s narcissism to make a larger cultural point about the plight of women in a contraceptive age.  All knit-picking aside, she is absolutely correct in her observation (as was Pope Paul VI’s prediction). 

Yes, you can add divorce, fornication, and a sex-saturated media to the list of our world’s ills also.  I rather doubt she’d disagree with that observation either.  So to borrow your own phrase, I guess I find your critical post “ridiculous”!

Paul Rimmer - first of all, apologies for the confusing formatting.  I blame the NCR on this one, because the formatting in the box I type doesn’t match what they spit out in the comment.

“As far as I can tell from the article, along with McCants, I don’t see any reasons she is giving for her argument that contraception is involved.”

It seems quite clear to me what she is saying, although she allowed Dr. Smith to make her case most clearly.  Jared summed things up clearly as well when he stated rhetorically, “perhaps, Jennifer is not claiming a physical causation, but ideological causation.  Would it surprise you that people who treat themsevles as objects would also allow themselves to only find value with themselves in physical features?”

“There are no real studies or experiments to determine this.
Such experiments would be very difficult to perform.”

Yes, science is deficient in certain areas of gaining knowledge and making sense of the world.  It takes other means of gaining knowledge to reach certain truths.  We need artists to look closely at the world and share their interpretation.  We need philosophers to reflect on the world as they see it and to make sense of human behavior.  Science - understood as being able to test hypotheses with experiments - does not give us all the answers and thank God, because life would be pretty boring if ALL we were able to do was test things with experiments (I’m not saying science doesn’t have an important place in acquiring knowledge, I’m just saying that it can’t be seen as the ONLY way to understand the world). 

“Before I read the article, I was not convinced that there is even this problem of pressure to sexualize. After reading the article, I am still unconvinced.”

I’m not sure how to argue against this point because to me it seems obvious based simply on my observations of reality.  A friend of mine is a school teacher in Orange County and he relates that breast enhancement surgery is a common gift his students receive on their 16th birthday.  I know many young women struggling with eating disorders because they feel pressure to look a certain way.  I wasn’t aware of the pressure older (past retirment age) women feel to look sexy, but now that I do it simply confirms something I have been feeling.  Sorry, I know that nothing in this paragraph was an “argument” for my view but, again, Fulwiler’s observation seems so obviously true that I can’t do any better than say, “Wake up, Paul.”

Busy day. I should probably focus on more important things now.  Blessings Paul, and thanks for getting me partway through a relatively slow workday.

Dear Bryan,

You are quite welcome.

Paul

Poor victims, right? This is what liberated women asked for and this is what they got. They are free to dress however they choose, and this is what they choose. The only reason there is market for that stuff is that women go out and buy it. Hard for me to feel sorry for that.

Kris,

Amusing comment: “Atheists trolling an article on a Catholic website where atheism isn’t actually mentioned.  You have to ask yourself ... why?”.  I agree, Jennifer didn’t mention atheists this time.  I was just checking. (Admit it, you’ed miss us if we were gone. I’d miss you!).

Mike McCants, I bow to your points.

A funny joke from Click and Clack this weekend.  Wife says, I want something that goes from zero to 200 in like 4 seconds for my birthday.  Husband buys her a bathroon scale.  Viewing of husband will be at Anderson funeral home.  (my wife and I laughed and laughed).

Rover.

Romulus: May I suggest that you consider the possibility that God is inviting you to reconsider your role as a sanctimonious jerkwad?

This is not a mere case of correlation, nor even a case of a plausible narrative after the facts are in.  This is a case of someone predicting that if X was done Y would happen, and that someone was denounced by everyone as an idiot as everyone knew Z would happen instead.  41 years after X was done Y happened and Z did not happen.  This is something altogether different than plucking out a random correlation after the fact or inventing a plausible explaination afterwards.

It is not possible to arrange for double blind, statistically significant matched paired t-tests, etc. for huge sociological experiments like this.  And that is not the point.  That a certain frame of reference and way of thinking foretold the outcome with such accuracy, when everyone, absolutely everyone, foretold something very different, is the point.

St Thomas Aquina’s states “causes can be direct or indirect, indirect causes dispose to an effect”, so if contraception causes men to see women as sex objects which in turn causes women to acknowlege this fact then women would be incline to have cosmetic surgery, kinda makes sense to me.

ArchBishop Fulton Sheen stated in 1979 that women who had abortions would later have mental health issues, the British Journal of Psychiatry recently came out with a report which shows that women who have had abortions have an 81% increased risk of mental health problems, how many times have we been told otherwise, Russia is paying families to have children because of the disastrous effects of abortion in that country.

To the person who mention World food production, the Malthus argument was made in the 1960’s in a popular book called “The Population Bomb”, of course it didn’t pan out…then there was global cooling and now global warning.

All just lies from the age of enlightenment, the modern world, secularist, atheists, environmentalist…God’s truth will always reveal itself.

Hard to write this as my jowls flap in the wind…but…Why don’t all the women in the world turn off the TV, radio, and net advertising—as well as magazines—and boycott the constant barrage of negative prodding?  Just try it.  One thing that comes home like truth is that the reality of just how sexy and attractive women are to men is so very different from what women perceive.  Most men enjoy salivating over nearly all women.  They’re just so glad to see any woman in the first place.  They are far less fussy than women, gay hair-dressers, and gay fashion designers who are building their designs for the flat-chested boys they prefer anyway.  Turn off the nonsense.  Since it is women who’ve been taking those pills—not men, it is not far for me to imagine that those pills have altered OUR consciousness to the point that all that excess estrogen makes us hate ourselves needlessly.  No, that’s not very scientific.  But, really!!  Today, the way Sophia looked then would not pass fashion muster.  She’s be considered too old and fat.  But men think differently.  Receiving a lifetime achievement award, Charlton Heston called her “a force of nature”.  Men are far more charitable than women.

Men actually admire women who can converse with them on an equal basis.

“One thing that comes home like truth is that the reality of just how sexy and attractive women are to men is so very different from what women perceive. ... They are far less fussy than women.”

Cosigned.

Whoever is pressuring women to look ‘perfectly sexy’ - or whatever you want to call it - it’s not men. If any woman takes issue with this statement, the most I’m willing to give on this point is, say, 5% of the male population. Five percent of the male population is concerned that the women he dates look perfectly sexy. The rest of us like a beautiful woman, sure, and there is such a thing as a picky man, but we are not the ones holding women to ridiculous, stringent, merciless, inhuman, and brutalizing standards of appearance. Women are doing that to themselves. I don’t know why. They’re facing pressure somewhere. But it’s not coming from the guys, at least not for the most part. The complaints guys do have about women have nothing to do with women not looking hot enough. Like Magistra Bona, I vote that advertising agencies are the real culprit here. Money, money, money…

I, for one, would love to see this nonsense disappear. I take no pleasure in it at all. None of this lunacy benefits me as a man in any way whatsoever. Actually it’s just contributing to the heart attack I’m sure I have coming my way. I have been bewildered, often, when a female friend or relative reveals that she is stressing out about a few pounds here, a couple of inches there, an asymmetry in this region or a birthmark in that one. Who cares? I never did. Personally, I have always preferred that a woman have some body fat. It’s healthy. And birthmarks, asymmetries, etc. - if I like a girl these things are not going to stop me from spending time with her. I really believe that most men feel the same way.

Again, where visceral attraction is concerned, I’m not trying to suggest men aren’t drawn to beautiful appearances. What I am saying is that men’s standards, like Magistra Bona says, are, I think, a great deal more lenient than many women I’ve met seem to realize, and in some ways qualitatively different (e.g., I for one prefer nice and feminine to sexy any day of the week - please keep your breasts to yourself). But then, is it really men’s reactions women are worried about? They aren’t responding to our input, after all. What’s going on here?

So much for appearances.

I think women do need to take some responsibility for this. Help each other. Influence one another. Persuade your friends to drop the nonsense. Create a protective circle where you and your friends, at least, are not going to waste valuable time and emotional energy capitulating to the exploitation of advertisers. Try a fast from new clothing and cosmetics if you tend to buy a lot of these things. If you do find guys who judge you by stringent standards of appearance - forget about them. What do they matter? If they say something to you, tell them you don’t care what they think, and mean it. Keep your prayer life strong so you are always connected to the source of your real value. Ask Jesus what He thinks is really important. And cling to your Rosary! Our Lady knows what womanhood is. Let her be the one to inform you, not the advertisers! What the hell do they know, and why were they ever worth your time!

And guys, let’s pray for our women and not be afraid to praise them for the many things we do like about them. Let’s encourage the women in our lives to detox from the advertising, and support them as they do so. Viva la revolucion…

Dan:
“Poor victims, right? This is what liberated women asked for and this is what they got. They are free to dress however they choose, and this is what they choose. The only reason there is market for that stuff is that women go out and buy it. Hard for me to feel sorry for that.”

Not all of us asked for this, but that doesn’t mean that we’re not affected by it.  I am slightly overweight, have a healthy self-esteem, and a husband who loves me the way I am; but I still feel the cultural pressure to dress sexily and to make my body not look like a body that has given birth.  It’s subtle, and it’s all around you, and often you act on it without even realizing that you only have that ideal in your head because of all the advertising, tv programs, etc. around you.  Yes, women are partly to blame, but don’t assume that the only reason people market sexy is because we want to buy it.  It’s a cycle; we want to buy it _because_ it’s marketed in a way that makes it seem like we need it.

“Yes, women are partly to blame, but don’t assume that the only reason people market sexy is because we want to buy it. It’s a cycle.”

Let’s boycott the hell out of these sons of a you-know-what (I don’t know what we’re allowed to say on the Register). The cosmetics, the magazines, the clothiers - drive them all to the ground!

May all the advertising agencies of Revol et al go broke. Amen.

*Revlon

The men I know think that there is no one sexier than a happy, confident woman of any age who takes good care of herself but doesn’t go overboard, who likes herself, likes people, likes her life, and responds well to men.

Other women, seeing a woman who might be an example of this, might shake their heads and say, “she looks her age! She’s about a size 10! She has a broken nail, too.” But many men looking at her see instead a voluptuous, vivacious, fun-to-be-with woman with a contagious zest for life.

Marion—you nailed it.  I am not a man, but I feel safe in saying that the kind of woman you described is irresistible to everyone—both women and men are drawn to her.  Furthermore, I think that while men’s heads are initially turned by your garden-variety “hot” woman, those women tend to be fussy, vain, self-centered, high-maintenance and generally a drag to be around.  Most men aren’t interested in that.

When a young woman becomes pregnant, nature tends to enlarge her breasts to serve as the source of food for her infant.  A byproduct of this is that she becomes even more attractive to her husband.
IMO, it is silly for a young woman to have “breast enlargement” surgery.  The problem in our culture may be that a young woman wants the more spectacular breasts of a nursing mother, w/o getting married and bearing a child.  What is the point of “sexy” if the person plans NOT to have children?

Mike McCants:  Casti Connubii from 1930 warned against legalizing contraception also since you seem to think that Humanae Vitae was too late.

“It takes other means of gaining knowledge to reach certain truths.”
When taken out of context, this seems like hilarious religious nonsense.
“that breast enhancement surgery is a common gift”
And it’s all because of the availability of contraceptives?  How silly.
“Fulwiler’s observation seems so obviously true”
The title has “Contraceptive Culture”.  That’s silly.  It should be “Sexualized Culture”?
“That a certain frame of reference and way of thinking foretold the outcome with such accuracy”
Hilarious.  Any one with any brains could have foreseen this future and many did and it had nothing to do with contraception.  Your opinion is just silly Catholic holier-than-thou bias.
“St Thomas Aquina’s states ...”
Were his states mental or physical?  North of the Mason-Dixon line or south?
“All just lies from the age of enlightenment, the modern world, secularist, atheists, environmentalist…God’s truth will always reveal itself.”
Hilarious.  Poe?  I guess not.
“but I still feel the cultural pressure to dress sexily and to make my body not look like a body that has given birth.”
Bzzzt!  You failed to mention contraception.  No Catholic points for you.

The sale or possession of contraceptives is legal.
The sale or possession of certain drugs is illegal.
The price and profits from contraceptives are reasonably small.
The price and profits from illegal drugs are reasonably? huge.
No one goes to jail for sale or possession of contraceptives.
Many people go to jail for the sale or possession of illegal drugs.
Do you wish that the sale or possession of contraceptives was illegal?
If so, you [improper language suppressed here].
If not, you are railing against a history that you do not really wish was different in this respect.  So you are simply trying to score holier-than-thou Catholic “points”.  I call “own goal”.

Mike,
““that breast enhancement surgery is a common gift”
And it’s all because of the availability of contraceptives?  How silly.”

Actually, if it weren’t for contraceptives (condoms, pill, abortion), most of those parents wouldn’t conceive of gifting breast enhancement.  Any girl superficial enough to alter her breasts in order to get the attention of the opposite sex (for, why else would she do it?) is almost certain to have sex before she or her parents want her to have children.  So, without contraception, breast enhancement would not be a viable option.  If you can’t see that connection, you’re blind.

God bless you Mike!

I appreciate the well written article presented here. One other note regarding fashion styles and body types has come to my notice over the last forty years or so, and that is the incredible shrinking female form.  If you look at “pin-up” girls from WWII and the “Bombshells” of the 1950’s (think Jayne Manson and Brigette Bardot) it was clear that women were being presented as sex objects BUT at least they were a clearly female form.

The sixties and seventies brought us the skinny supermodel…again, a rare female body type but one that did exist (Twiggy reports she ate like a horse, it was just her natural body type.)  THEN came the body type that rarely occurs when God is doing all the designing….a slender to skinny woman with HUGE breast. Most thin women have small busts, most large-breasted women also have larger hips and rear ends.

Somehow, this all seemed to become the norm when gay men started designing clothing and chosing their models…because a supermodel today has the figure of a fourteen year old BOY but with artifically enhanced breasts. It is almost as if gay men came up with a cartoon of what THEY though a sexy woman would look like….if they cared!

“if it weren’t for contraceptives ...”
Well, I know Catholics don’t do “nuance”.
But I have to ask - on balance, is the world better off with safe, fairly reliable contraceptives or no contraceptives at all?  Obviously, knowledge of what causes babies has been around for a few thousands of years.  So there were ways (not very reliable) of reducing the chances of conception.  Wiki: “Condoms have been used for at least 400 years.”  Apparently IUDs have a much more recent history.  And there was always abstinence.  Try “abstinence-only” education.  How does that work out?  So the real issue is the “drug” contraceptives?
Bottom line: Since even Catholics use contraceptives at a very high rate, I would have to assume that most of them would vote for the availability of safe, reliable contraceptives.

The debate about contraception has hijacked this whole thread and misses a major point in the article:

“Whereas beauty takes the entire person into consideration, sexiness is about making yourself an object of lust.”

I don’t think you can deny this statement. I think Jennifer could do another post on this concept. There is a difference between beauty and sexy. Sometimes they overlap, sometimes not. And perhaps, sexy as beautiful is in the eyes of the beholder. There are many “sexy” things that are promoted as beautiful that are tacky and downright ugly. The clothes some girls and women wear used to be known as “hooker clothes” but are seen at school, the mall, even church. I am not kidding. They look like hookers. Or at least what we thought of as hooker clothes.

I for one, think it is very sad that women go for what makes them “hot” rather than what makes them beautiful. The words pretty, lovely, girly or ladylike are almost non existent in discussions of fashion. I think it is creepy it is all about sexy.

BTW, to the trolls, abstinence is 100% effective when practiced. The nuance here is that if a pregnancy results, abstinence was not practiced. Abstinence doesn’t fail but people fail to abstain from having sex. Just say no.

Women who have Botox, look like they have had Botox. Sure they’re wrinkle free, but we can tell the difference.

I totally agree with Magistra Bona, Marion and David.  I think it has more to do with greed and selfishness of the industry.  They want to expand their audience, so now they are moving to children and geriatrics.  They pump up the marketing and buzz and it creates a demand for the product because they know there is a market of children and women out there with low self-esteem.  But I guess you could link anything to anything with a few degrees of separation.

Ann, sorry for the previous post re: 100%(it may be before or after this one).

@Mike McCants: The importance of the development and mainstreaming of the contraceptive pill for the sexual revolution is so universally recognized well established in sociology as to be essentially axiomatic. I am aware of no sociological work on the sexual revolution that does not acknowledge that the pill helped to change sexual norms. Causation, not mere correlation. If you are aware of any contrarian sociological work, I would be curious to know about it.

Being ‘sexy’ is, or used to be, primarily about signaling fertility, am I right?  Why would a 70-year-old need to worry about being ‘sexy’ (conspicuously fertile), then?  There is still value in her affection and companionship.  But now sex is not necessarily connected to fertility (or fertility to age—thanks, IVF), so why would ‘sexiness’ be either.

“The superstitious will regularly see a cause, and then imagine irrelevant effects. Then there are people who see an effect, and then imagine irrelevant causes. We call them Catholics.”
-
Paul: ever consider maybe you are the one with the cataract?  Because after considering the effect for years, the cause (or if you prefer, the core or heart of it) gets more and more obvious every day.  And Paul, the point of a persuasive article is to state the idea with confidence, not to hem and haw and undermine oneself.
-
Mike: what made you jump straight to theocracy?  I didn’t see anybody talking about banning the Pill, except you.  Don’t you think almost anything that is worth achieving can be achieved by persuasion? 
-
About contraceptives and the spread of disease—first of all, most of them don’t actually do this, and the ones that do are not exactly failproof.  Second, I think Pope Benedict made it pretty clear (to everyone except certain media incompetents, that is) in his opinion that this use of contraceptives might in some cases be better than not giving a da*n, but it still isn’t good in itself.  The best solution for non-married persons is not to be having sex in the first place.  Why is that so hard to understand?
-
“if it weren’t for contraceptives ...”
Well, I know Catholics don’t do “nuance”.
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Oh Mike, have you any idea how often the opposite is true?  Case in point, your ability to go from 0 to theocracy in three seconds?
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“Try ‘abstinence-only’ education. How does that work out?”
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It is working quite fine (as it does whenever it is actually taken seriously) here, thank you.  13+ years and no unpleasant surprises.  And while I won’t be flip and say it’s easy to do, life does seem to get easier when you positively don’t need to worry about those sort of things—diseases, contraceptive failure, or how you’re “performing”—as if the economy wasn’t enough.

First, I just want to say, kudos, Jennifer.  :) I think that you are bringing up very valid points on how contraception affections society in more than just the purely physical realm. 

Second, to the above commenter who seems to keep feeling the need to explain that 80% of Catholics ignore this teaching.  Yeah, it’s probably, true, yep, it’s a bummer (they’re missing out!), but most importantly, THAT DOESN’T MAKE A DIFFERENCE AS TO WHETHER OR NOT A TEACHING IS RIGHT. (Sorry for annoying caps, don’t know how to italicize in a combox. ;)) I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make with that. It only shows me that a lot of Catholics are suffering from the same anxieties/concerns that a lot of secular people worry about. 

Third, I have to say that I’m pretty lucky my husband and I don’t buy in to this.  My husband and I are in our mid 20s and I’m 6 months pregnant with my second baby.  I cannot believe how much larger I am with this pregnancy and I get a little self conscious about my thighs, butt, what have you, but my loving NFP-using husband winks and tells me he loves how I look when pregnant and those parts never looked better.  Ha! But it makes me feel good!

Sundry other remarks…

Dan: do you really think that’s what most of them would buy if they thought it didn’t matter?
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trad girl: I’m not sure why you thought that was called for; it was a perfectly legitimate question, asked politely.  On further discernment, Mary might find that the answer is no, or that it is even more complicated than that, but it’s not taboo.
-
Jacob: well put!

I will tell you a major solution for this, as far as individual feelings of inferiority, etc, go:  Tune out of the prevailing culture, and dress modestly.

When you dress modestly these insane, brainwashed-in fears go away. And not wearing pants helps. (I’m not trying to start an argument, but it is a fact that wearing pants makes women obsessed with what their hips and rears look like, whereas when you wear skirts, I can tell you from personal experience, you don’t worry about that, as long as the skirts aren’t tight.) Thanks be to God, I have entirely lost the obsession with body shape and all that, thanks to modest dressing. I like my body, which is not for anyone else to gawk at and evaluate, thank you very much!

Ladies, I think too many of us try to straddle both worlds. There is NO REASON that you have to either listen, or care, much less follow, what the world says about women’s beauty, fashion, etc. It’s hard, because we are such social creatures, but let us create our own modern, Christian, modest way of being, and ignore the trash that is rammed down our throats constantly. We do not have to be sheeple, just taking in whatever is given. Think for ourselves!

Very well said!

“abstinence is 100% effective when practiced.”
And so you are proposing legislation that mandates abstinence?
“The importance of the development and mainstreaming of the contraceptive pill for the sexual revolution is so universally recognized well established in sociology” ... “the pill helped to change sexual norms”
I already admitted that that was possible.  However, there is a lot of difference between the outward display of sexuality and the actual behavior of individuals.  Jennifer says “This isn’t a surprising turn of events, considering that our culture now tells women that if they are not sexy, they are not valuable.”  That does not seem to be exactly the same as the “sexual revolution”.  Why has it taken 40 or 80 years for this “cause” to produce this “effect”?  Could there be any other contributing factors?  Movies, TV, pornography?

Supposing for a few milliseconds that you have identified a “problem” with modern society - what do you plan to DO about it?  I recommend that you write a letter to your local Congressman and demand that he introduce a bill in the next session to make contraceptives illegal.  I’m sure you will get a polite reply - after all, he sends polite replies to all sorts of cranks and kooks every day.

This seems like an awful lot of weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth about a “problem” in modern society without the slightest chance of actually changing the status quo.

“Don’t you think almost anything that is worth achieving can be achieved by persuasion?”
You have had 40 or 80 years to work your persuasion.  I think you have failed.  Human nature and modern society trumps your persuasion.

“The best solution for non-married persons is not to be having sex in the first place.  Why is that so hard to understand?”
I have not the slightest difficulty in understanding that.  I don’t need persuading.  But I do taxes for a very large number of Hispanic single mothers here is Austin and I bet a lot of them were supposedly Catholic.  They need persuading.  But they are only 17 to 21 and they aren’t listening.

“THAT DOESN’T MAKE A DIFFERENCE AS TO WHETHER OR NOT A TEACHING IS RIGHT.”
That depends on who gets to decide what is “right” and what is “wrong”.  The point is that this world and society are much better off actually having and using contraceptives than it would be if they were not available.  And, of course, there is no chance that they will not be available.  So an awful lot of people are ignoring your teaching because they really do not consider that that teaching is “right” for them.

“Jennifer says “This isn’t a surprising turn of events, considering that our culture now tells women that if they are not sexy, they are not valuable.”  That does not seem to be exactly the same as the “sexual revolution”.  Why has it taken 40 or 80 years for this “cause” to produce this “effect”?  Could there be any other contributing factors?  Movies, TV, pornography?”

 
The contraceptive pill was first approved in the United States in 1960. The groundswell of the sexual revolution was the 1960s, though it has roots going back decades earlier and the aftershocks continued for decades. Movies, TV and pornography use all changed markedly in the 1960s and subsequent decades in connection with the sexual revolution.
 
The full effects of a revolution often take decades or even longer to be fully felt. For example, the push for same-sex marriage is clearly a post-sexual revolution phenomenon, but it took decades to build any momentum—and the fallout from this new phase of the sexual revolution will take decades more to sort out. Remember the famous, semi-apocryphal story about Zhou Enlai’s opinion of the French Revolution: “It’s too soon to say.”

I don’t know.  I think it contributes to the cause.  But I also think that the whole breakdown of the family unit is the big cause (and this actually started when the men went to war, and not because of contraception).  So when women started going off to work, all these children were being raised without a mother figure to look up to and appreciate.  They spent a puny 20 minutes with mom at the end of the day, according to studies.  And while a man is given respect and dignity by his work, a woman often is not.  No matter what she does she can not earn everyone’s total respect.  We’ve devalued stay at home moms so much that if she does stay home, she is expected not to be able to raise her own kids alone, but to give them the “necessary” 4 or 5 extracurricular activities.  If she works, she is made to feel guilty for not being there for her kids, even if she can’t be.  There really is no respect just handed to women.  The only thing both conservatives and liberals seem to agree on is that a man without a job is a loser, and one who works hard is a decent sort of person.  But women can’t get real respect no matter what they do.

Mouse, I don’t agree that skirts make you less obsessed with your body especially when most skirts makes your hips and rear look larger, but I understand how immodest dress causes women to feel less than “sexy”.  On the other hand, modest dress can also be very attractive and sexy to men (ie Shabby apple).

Karen, another great counter argument.

The nay sayers should read Humane Vitae.  It is amazing how Pope Paul IV nailed it in ‘68.  Those who can’t connect the dots are willfully ignorant, as I used to be.  When those blinders come off, the light is incredible.

Jennifer, you are obviously doing something right to have these staunch opponents to the Church following your blog.  Keep spreading the truth!  And we will all pray that they will open their hearts to the Lord.

Today’s anecdote from the tax center:
The younger sister has one child, the older sister has four children, but two of them live in Mexico, so they don’t count.  So the actual “family” is two sisters and three young children.  One sister does not have a Social Security number, the other sister has now received a “permission to work with INS approval” social security number.  The younger sister keeps the children and the older sister works (in a restaurant?).  The older sister can now file amended tax returns for the last three years - 2008, 2009, and 2010.  Of course the children were all born in the USA, so they all have social security cards.  The amended tax returns are now eligible for Earned Income Credit - the total refunds claimed today for the three years were about $13,000.  In future years, the older sister (claiming the three children) will receive about $7,000 per year in Earned Income Credit and Child Tax Credit.  I really would have a slightly difficult time making up this story if it had not happened today.  The word “husband” was not mentioned today.

Austin schools are now more than 50% Hispanic and you can guess the trend.  Perhaps “contraception” is a problem, but it seems to me that “husbands” and “marriage” is a much bigger problem.

Contraception was allowed by the Protestant denominations about 80 years ago.  The Sexual Revolution was 40 or 50 years ago.  If you are trying to “persuade” people that contraception is “wrong”, I think you should try to find a different windmill to tilt at because you don’t have a snowball’s chance in that mythological warm place at having any success.

How sad and strangely funny it will be in the future when our “ancient” culture is studied and observed:

“Doctors were actually injecting women’s buttocks with substances to make them larger while also vacuuming substances out of them to make them smaller, all in the name of a type of vanity termed sexiness.  Women paid large sums of money for these risky procedures and sometimes died from them.”

Regarding all the nay sayers.  The argument seems less to be that she is wrong, and more that they don’t think we can solve the problem, so lets just find a different “cause” to blame to just patch it over and make it look like you’re helping things.

It’s kinda like going to the doctor for back pain and being put on strong pain pills to mask the problem, rather than actually evaluating the cause of the pain, referring you to a chiropractor for an adjustment and suggesting exercises to strengthen the back and help you lose the weight that’s probably contributing to the problem.  Pain pills are the easy way out for both parties, and will be chosen by most, if given the option.  But this is still not the best solution.  Those who go the second route will likely have a better quality of life in the end.  Those who take the first, will likely get worse, because the problem is not addressed, and will lead to other health problems (increased pain/more meds, liver or kidney problems from the meds, heart disease from becoming more sedentary due to the pain, etc.) 

Same in this situation.  You say, it’s too difficult to prove, it’s too inconvenient, people won’t buy it, etc.  That still doesn’t mean that what she says isn’t true.  Those who do see it, can make changes to positively impact themselves and their families, which will improve the world around them.  Those of us who have seen the light, we have experienced the difference.  We want to share this with those around us, because many of us have been where they are and haven’t always made the best choices.  I’m one of those people.  Thank God I had friends who gently led me to the Catholic Church.  Make no mistake, noone can heal you (spiritually) better than God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  And His will for us is best understood through the teachings of the Catholic Church. Of that I am certain.  Just because many people, even Catholics, don’t follow a teaching, doesn’t make it untrue. Truth is truth, whether you believe it or not, and it will bear out in the end.

Miraposa, I totally agree “Truth is truth, whether you believe it or not, and it will bear out in the end”. Unfortunately we aren’t at the “end” yet, so until then we can only speculate and make predictions.

enness: I forgot to mention that I was “trad girl.”  I know I was rude to Romulus, but his remark seemed obviously rude to me.  If he was simply being careless, I apologize.  Let me be clear: I also think that the use of Extraordinary Ministers has become too, well, ordinary.  But I wouldn’t dream of attacking the good people who volunteer for the job.  The priest is responsible for deciding who handles the Eucharist, so complain to him if you don’t like the way things are done.  Mary asked for advice on a sensitive medical question.  She didn’t ask for input on her service as an EM.  Romulus was implying that God is punishing Mary with the Cramps from Hell because she is committing a liturgical faux pas.

“It is amazing how Pope Paul IV nailed it in ‘68.”
Hilarious.  You are claiming that the sociologists at that time were blind and stupid?
“you are obviously doing something right to have these staunch opponents to the Church following your blog.”
We are so surprised that we are not censored.
And the quaint ideas about reversing history are amusing.
And writing “reasoning with atheists” was hilarious.
“That still doesn’t mean that what she says isn’t true.”
What is means it that her opinion (and the Church’s opinion) is irrelevant.
“Truth is truth, whether you believe it or not, and it will bear out in the end”.
Hilarious.  Who gets to define “truth”?  Catholics?
“Unfortunately we aren’t at the “end” yet”
Hilarious.  This would appear to be a religious nonsense statement.
“until then we can only speculate and make predictions.”
I predict things will get worse.  It’s a very easy prediction to make.

Thanks for this article, Jen!  I felt frustrated when I read about Helen Mirren’s bikini shoot.  Yes, she is very beautiful, but why should she have to have to display her flesh for our appraisal, as if she were a slave on a scaffold?  I assume that she, being 62, is only doing this because she really wants to; but I have read so many actresses tell the story of the first time a photographer got them to strip down for a camera.  The story usually goes, at first I was uncomfortable, but finally I was able to be comfortable with my body. 
That phrase, “I am trying to feel comfortable with my body,” is an odd little code for “I am trying to feel comfortable with strangers gazing at my (mostly) naked body.”  It has always felt like a bit of battered woman-speak to me.  Even being slender and twenty-something, I have never worn a bikini because I can’t bear the thought of walking around in what is essentially underwear.  We women are expected to share this bride-like vulnerability with the crowds at public pools and beaches, and the results are grim magazine exhortations to get our poor, imperfect bodies “bikini ready”... not to mention widespread self-loathing and eating disorders.

Mike, if our schtick is that “hilarious,” why aren’t you applauding?  Show us some love!

Bob, what you’ve just said is spiteful and ugly.  And beyond sad.  “Expensive crotch droppings”?  Have you no decency?

“I have never understood… the desire to live for something other than a brood of poorly timed and expensive crotch droppings.”

Wow!

You mean… children?

I get it, I get it. This is what we call ‘baiting’. Moving on…

I think the participation of dissenting commenters is good for the community here as they challenge us Catholics to explore our faith, improve the areas where our understanding is weak, and generally refine our ability to communicate and defend the Faith to the world at large… but much of the dissent we see here is carelessly constructed, insulting, juvenile, and outright inflammatory. Mutual respect and civility need to be the cornerstone of all these conversations. Somewhere on this great big Internet, someone must have developed a solid commenting policy that the National Catholic Register can use here. We need a few good moderators to keep the discussions here productive and worthwhile.

David, totally agree. 

Wsquared, totally agree.

Bob, no one is better for your comment.  Although I could be accused of not doing it: Think, type, read, correct, read, think, (retype as necessary), send.  Type, send, think isn’t a good process. In the military, I was taught not to ready, fire, aim.

Civil discourse deserves better.

Rover.

“why aren’t you applauding?”
Well, many comedians do very absurd things for laughs.  You are interesting comedians and I am laughing, but there is a little problem with applause.  Applause might indicate approval and I withhold approval.
“what you’ve just said is spiteful and ugly”
Yes.  Have you no “class”?  Can’t you say derogatory things in a gentle manner?  You could say:  “I have never understood the opposition to contraception” and just leave it at that.  Of course the obvious reply is the Pope told us that we must behave that way.  He still won’t understand, but at least the proper communication will have taken place.
“refine our ability to communicate and defend the Faith to the world at large”
Oh noes!  You are going to try to defend the faith?  I can’t believe it!  Oops, that seems to be a statement of “belief”.  Really, it’s just a prediction of what might not happen in the future.
“dissent we see here is carelessly constructed”
What would a properly-constructed criticism of “belief without evidence” actually be?  The God Delusion?  A Letter to a Christian Nation?  Other books by atheists?
“Mutual respect”
Oops.  How can one who sees “belief without evidence” as quite irrational properly respect it?  As a nice social club to belong to as long as you don’t try to influence legislation and as long as politicians like the current crop of Republicans (save one) don’t try to use faith as their stepping stone to election?  I can’t see any “respect” for this in my future.
“a solid commenting policy that the National Catholic Register can use here”
Better known as censorship of dissenting views?
“keep the discussions here productive and worthwhile.”
Bzzzt!  There are no discussions.  My sarcastic comments are only worthwhile if such comments cause someone to think about their faith.  Your comments only serve as illustrations of dogmatic thinking.

Somebody get this guy off our website. There’s no reason we have to put up with this insulting nonsense.

Prior to Paul6 in 1967:

“For, as Mr. Russell is never tired of pointing out, the use of contraceptives has made sexual intercourse independent of parenthood, and the marriage of the future will be confined to those who seek parenthood for its own sake rather than as the natural fulfilment of sexual love.

But under these circumstances who will trouble to marry?

Marriage will lose all attractions for the young and the pleasure-loving and the poor and the ambitious. The energy of youth will be devoted to contraceptive love and only when men and women have become prosperous and middle-aged will they think seriously of settling down to rear a strictly limited family. It is impossible to imagine a system more contrary to the first principles of social well-being.”

Christopher Dawson, 1933

http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/marriage/mf0060.html

Again, the burden is put upon women to clean up their act and stop tempting men. If men didn’t want us to be like this, we wouldn’t be like this. The truth is men—both Catholic and non-Catholic—leave older-looking women for younger women. Moreover, HIV and other STDs and making men turn to very young females, many whom we consider to still be children. If men are to be proper Catholics, they have to take some action to raise their sons to respect women of all ages and understand that women are more than sex objects.

Mike,

While I have a very different perspective from you, I do enjoy our posts.  You referred to “belief without evidence” several times.  Surely you do not mean there is no evidence at all for God, do you?  I can understand you saying there is no definitive proof; I can also undertand your criticism of the evidence that there is, but to say there is no evidence at all seems to me to be well beyond what is even reasonable, isn’t it?

By Merideth:
“Even being slender and twenty-something, I have never worn a bikini because I can’t bear the thought of walking around in what is essentially underwear.  We women are expected to share this bride-like vulnerability with the crowds at public pools and beaches, and the results are grim magazine exhortations to get our poor, imperfect bodies “bikini ready”... not to mention widespread self-loathing and eating disorders.”
—-
This is my point—why is there a demand on women to be young, slender, and beautiful to be approved by men—especially Catholic men?
—-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ynXGSJyz7w

Contraception tells your spouse not to give himself or yourself to each other completely…I’ll love and respect you…almost….I will NOT give you my fertility or I will put a barrier against you being united to me in the marital act. Contraception led to legalized abortions and the end of marriage as we knew it…but it’s “a choice” seems to mean you can do whatever you want to God’s body given to you and any possible children whom may be born from you. society tells women that contraception makes you “free” when it really puts women in a prison. It ends marriages for some very obvious reasons but the fact that people who contacept (against conception) don’t have that dialouge on a daily basis about how things are going for each other and the marriage as a whole…when you contracept you are using artificial means to end natural conversations that should be occuring between a married couple. An HONEST doctor or pharmacist will tell you that the “pill” is an abortaficient…It’s not an opinion but a scientific fact…if it weren’t, woman would safely be able to continue taking it without concern for the baby growing in them. taking “the pill” also masks potential real medical problems such as infertility, thyroid disease and ovarian cysts to name a few…this “liberating pill” is really like I said…a PRISON the Church respects woman so much that it tells them NOT to alow their bodies to be “playgrounds” but as temples. Could be why only 2% of couples who use NFP divorce compaired to the 50% who end primarily from the contraceptive attitude.

Mary: Why are women allowing men to dictate their choices to them?

My first thought when I saw the headlines was that sometimes in the NFP world women can never rest.  There are marriages with issues mentioned above in couples who use NFP or don’t use anything to space children.  Some women are treated as objects just the same by husbands who tell them they are not open to life if they do not have sex whenever he wants to.  Some women have 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 kids in very short times spans—one child every year.  It seems there is no rest for them either.  To be fair I am commenting without reading the article in its entirety but I’ve read similiar articles that blame everything in the world on contraception but deny the reality of the serious issues some couples have with NFP.

From a comment above:  “Could be why only 2% of couples who use NFP divorce compaired to the 50% who end primarily from the contraceptive attitude. “

Is this statisic backed up by anything?  Who did the study and how many couples are in it?  Show me a study that compares couples who use contraception but worship together and prayer together versus couples who do the same and use NFP.  More than 2% of the couples I know who use NFP have divorced and some have very difficult marriages with significant issues.  Are the couples who use NFP and not divorced all living in marriages that they want to stay in or does their faith tell them they have no choice?  Don’t look at NFP thru rose colored glasses.  The problems in this article are an attitude of the heart and these problems can still exist in couples who use NFP.

I personally do not know any women who are getting plastic surgery.  Where are all these women?  Hollywood?

Jennifer-what a great post.  Holy cow, I had no idea that what seems obvious to those of us women who’ve lived both sides of the story could be so controversial.  It would be nice if someone would look at the whole vasectomy issue, too.  How do wives of vasectomized men feel?  What does that little procedure do to a man’s self-image & sexuality?  And I second the opinion that even if 80 percent Catholics are ignoring this teaching doesn’t mean it’s flawed or should be changed.  It’s like Mom always said, if all your friends jumped off the Golden Gate, does that make it a good idea?

Ha- I see this at Mass…We have a 70 year old nun who shows cleavage, explain that to me. Someone who is Catholic please explain it to me!!! And another lady who must be in her late 70s showing her cleavage, at Mass!! It’s embarrassing.

Most older women dress like teenagers. When I get old, I’m dressing like an old woman. I can’t wait to never have to worry about fashion again.

And I think the pressure to look sexy is ironic, counterproductive….Example, you see women tanning- which leads to wrinkles. I don’t get it. You’re going to tan constantly now so you can look like a wrinkled up prune at age 40? So then you have to inject yourself with botox and have surgeries to look sexy again. Think of all the harmful things women are doing to their bodies, including dying your hair constantly till it’s all friend and unnatural. Yumm chemicals seeping into your skin.

At the same time, I see women who dress so frumpy and are grossly overweight. No excuse to be over weight at any age. I guess part of the reason is women all work, and that mostly includes sitting at a desk all day long. Going to workout an hour a day is not going to make up for sitting all day long.

It’s extreme on both sides. Where’s middle ground?

Mary-
This is my point—why is there a demand on women to be young, slender, and beautiful to be approved by men—especially Catholic men?

I think a lot of women are harder on each other than men. We went to Florida a couples times this year and I see women wearing bathing suits that I would never wear if I had their shape. I think you need to be a firm and fit size 4 to wear a bikini with no stretch marks. I weigh 125lbs and am 5’5 and I feel way to self conscience to wear a bikini.  But my husband thinks Im nuts and thinks the women look just fine. ( he’s not gawking at other women, but I just wanted to know his opinion)

Women are competitive with other women. When I go out with my girlfriends I will primp myself all up, more so than when I go on a date with my husband.  That’s bc he prefers me with no makeup and my hair air dried so it’s naturally wavy.

I probably sound really shallow, but I just wanted to get the point across that I don’t think it’s men that put the pressure on women.

“There’s no reason we have to put up with this insulting nonsense.”
I recommend that you stay home and turn off your TV and computer in order to avoid all contact with the “real world”.
“the marriage of the future will be confined to those who seek parenthood for its own sake”
Worse.  Those who become parents won’t even bother to get married.  And the US tax laws typically give them better tax benefits if they remain unmarried.  Anecdote from last week:  The mother had three children - ages 19, 11, and 2.  And all three had different last names and those three last names were all different from her last name.  Four people on the tax return and four different last names.

“Surely you do not mean there is no evidence at all for God, do you?”
Yes, of course I do.  Define “evidence”.
“I can also understand your criticism of the evidence that there is”
What evidence is there that is not in your book of mythology?  Miracles?  Simply hearsay.  There is similar evidence for Bigfoot, the Loch Ness monster, etc.  The evidence for UFOs is overwhelming and unconvincing.  Alien abductions?  Give me a break.
“to say there is no evidence at all”
There is no evidence that would stand up to scientific scrutiny.  In fact, there was even a recent discussion on whether or not there could ever actually be any evidence at all?  When the stars are re-arraigned to spell out “Bow before your Klingon god”, then I will start to worry.

“Contraception tells your spouse not to give himself or yourself to each other completely”
Well, that seems to be a rather judgmental opinion.  I disagree.
“Contraception led to legalized abortions”
Legalization happened nearly 40 years ago.  I don’t think that legalization was all that related to contraception.  At any rate, it’s water under the bridge and irrelevant to the future.  It seems to me that failure to use proper contraception would lead to more unwanted pregnancies and more abortions.
““a choice” seems to mean you can do whatever you want to God’s body given to you”
Yes, it does.  So make drugs illegal.  Make contraception illegal.  Make suicide illegal.  Make “assisted dying” illegal.  It’s hard to make everything that you dislike illegal.  And that “God’s body” is simply silly.  It’s my body, not Zeus’s, Apollo’s, Thor’s, or any other god’s body.
“don’t have that dialouge on a daily basis”
Life is a little busy to have such a weighty conversation every night.  Once a year?  Meantime, let’s not have to worry too much about getting pregnant.
“even if 80 percent Catholics are ignoring this teaching doesn’t mean it’s flawed”
Well, it seems you are deciding that only a small percentage of Catholics really deserve to be called Catholics.  Please tell them to find another religion or none at all?  That’s the problem with your “absolute morality”.  When the real world decides not to conform to your exact specifications, you have to judge them wrong for some reason or another.  It seems to me that this particular windmill is so much less important than so many other problems.  Why emphasize it unless you are trying to distinguish Catholic teaching as something special?  Well, my opinion is that no teaching is special and this one is a lot less special than some of the others.

Another great article by Jennifer. THank you.

David:
Mary: Why are women allowing men to dictate their choices to them?
——-
Same reason anyone stays in an abusive relationship—social pressure and lack of social support. The world is a competitive place, feminists are degraded (including on this site), and women are exploited sexually in magazines and other social media. Sex sells, and porn queens (and kings) make an awful lot of money and have many fans. A woman who is not “sexy” is often ignored, which may be worse that being scorned. Men usually have no problem being life-long bachelors, but being an old maid is still a mark against a woman.

Natasha:
You are seeing the consequences of the social pressure on women to be young and attractive—even to the point of showing their aging cleavage at church. Old age is not honored, especially older women.
You are married, and obviously your husband loves you as you are and you feel secure about yourself. Consider yourself very, very blessed. Most women know a man would not give them a second look if they did not look attractive.
Why do you bother to dress up when you go places with other women (assuming it is casual)—you don’t think you will be liked as you are by them?
Also, how should old ladies dress? Maybe it is not appropriate for church, but can’t they primp up as well?

“At the same time, I see women who dress so frumpy and are grossly overweight. No excuse to be over weight at any age. I guess part of the reason is women all work, and that mostly includes sitting at a desk all day long. Going to workout an hour a day is not going to make up for sitting all day long.”

Would it be a good excuse to be overweight if you had children and were unable to work out an hour a day because you cared for them?  I wondering if you were really serious with this post.  Women are overweight because they all work and sit all day long?  Is this the same reason so many men are overweight or is it ok for them to be overweight?

It sounds very painful, Mary. There is a lot of injustice in this world. But Christ is always there in the middle of it, and His peace is always available to us. Don’t be afraid.

It may help to know that there are men who feel your pain, though from the opposite perspective. I’m sure you do not imagine that every man is the object of every woman’s undying admiration. Women also have their preferences. As women feel the pressure to appeal to men, so men also feel the pressure to appeal to women, lest we should wind up alone and unwanted (the particular name for such a man is ‘loser’, and he will certainly feel like one). We, too, can become invisible, and yes, we also have to work hard to prevent that from happening. And being a bachelor is considered a mark against a man too.

If you haven’t already, you should try reading a book called ‘Left to Tell’ by Imaculèe Ilabagiza. It shows the way one woman grappled with overwhelming injustice. Like you, Imaculèe found herself too intimately acquainted with the unbridled insanity of the world around her. Remarkably, she managed to find peace and equanimity, even in the worst of the storm - and this, of course, was by her persistent and unrelenting recourse to prayer.

don’t feed the Trolls.

Vulvas… drag behind women like trains?? Oh, jeez. Must be all this patriarchal brain-washin’ fluffanutta I got stuck a-twixt ma’ ears ‘cause I was durned sure I was the one as has the dangly appendages. If only I knew somethin’ ‘bout women’s ana-to-my like Mister Bob here I might has a chance a-catchin’ up to that thar MADARN WORLD. I’m talkin’ Industryal Revolution, ya hear, and the gentrification of us simple Catlick folks. Now I hope y’all excuse me ‘cause I gotta warn my wife ‘bout her vulva a-fore the kids trip over it. Any one of the 34 kids we has, a hyuk-hyuk-hyuk!

don’t feed the idiots

In this case, same difference.

“Women and weight”
Yup women are over weight bc they sit all day long at a desk. My mother in law is trying to loose weight but it’s hard for her bc she has a desk job. She fights traffic an hour each way into work, and often doesn’t get home till 6pm, now she doesn’t have any kids at home but by the time she were to exercise an hour at the gym she wouldn’t get home till 730. She gets up at 5am. It’s hard for her, and she really needs way more than one hour of movement but how is she going to squeeze that into her day?  She has to work, she has no choice. A woman that stays home with her children does not sit all day long. I go for walks with my kids, do yard work, and housecleaning- all forms of movement. I’m blessed to have plenty of opportunity to move. We put tons of pressure on women to be thin, but it’s almost impossible when you have to sit at a desk all day long. Humans are meant to move, all day!
Men are also over weight bc they sit all day long- but we weren’t talking about Men in this post.

My husband works construction in a refinery. I went to pick him up from work one day and 500 construction workers came out of the gate to go home. not ONE was over weight, they were all built. It was a shocking sight. Husband says they all eat bologna sandwiches on white bread and Hostess snacks for lunch. My husband doesn’t need to work out- he gets a 8-10 hour constant workout 5-6 days a week.

MARY-
“Why do you bother to dress up when you go places with other women (assuming it is casual)—you don’t think you will be liked as you are by them?
Also, how should old ladies dress? Maybe it is not appropriate for church, but can’t they primp up as well?”

Women are competitive with each other, that was my point. Old ladies should not show cleavage. I’m young and I don’t show cleavage. It’s disturbing, church or no church.  Oh I plan to primp up when I’m old, more so now bc I’ll have more time and hopefully more money.  I just plan to still dress respectably and not dress like a teenager. We have some beautiful older women at my church, they don’t need any makeup and they dress so elegantly and feminine.

Thank you, I am very blessed. My husband thinks I’m beautiful even when I think I look like a disaster.  I think it’s good that women dress to impress, we just put way too much pressure on ourselves and set up standards that are impossible to keep in old age.

Bob Rodriguez - good thing your mom wanted to have a child instead of saving trees.

Natasha,
Women and men are not overweight because they sit at a desk all day.  People are overweight because they burn less than they consume.  Your mother in law would loose weight if she ate less food, you don’t have to exercise to be the correct weight.  I applaud you for being a SAHM, but not every SAHM is thin and active.

mrsceecee- When you sit all day long it’s pretty hard to burn more than you consume, that was my point. And if you want to loose weight you have to exercise and move, more than one hour a day.  You do have to move to be at a correct weight and be healthy. and she has lost weight, but not as much as she would if she moved more. Being healthy and fit is not just about eating right, it’s about moving and exercising. These are basic heath principles. We are not meant to sit all day long, we are meant to move. People are getting blood clots in their legs bc they sit all day long. And I did not say every SAHM is thin and active, I said every SAHM has the opportunity to be active. Please read and comprehend what I wrote before you comment.

enness:

The point of a persuasive article is to persuade, ideally using some sort of reason, evidence, genuine argumentation, instead of asserting that “something no one likes happened”, “something Catholics don’t like happened”, therefore “what Catholics don’t like caused what everyone doesn’t like.”

Because that second sort of “persuasive article” is only good for persuading those who are already convinced. I doubt this article, or anything Jennifer’s written really, has really persuaded anyone about these things.

It’s great literature for the choir.

Natasha,
You have opportunity to move when you work all day as well.  Most employers provide breaks and lunch hours, so that employees can get up and move around.  They can also walk to work (or park in the back of the parking lot) and utilize the stairs.  Being healthy and fit is a choice and it has nothing to do with where you spend your day. 
/
Women and Rest,
There is actually a study that backs up this claim.  I asked the same question a few months ago and someone posted a very good study that looking at women with various religions and ages and what type of birth control they used.  Even amongst the women who used NFP for non-religious reasons were least likely to be divorced.  It actually changed my mind about NFP.

I think it’s good that women dress to impress, we just put way too much pressure on ourselves and set up standards that are impossible to keep in old age.

—-
I still think it is our need to be loved by men, not matter what, that pressures competition between women.
—-
Also, on the subject of being overweight, let not forget we live in a “fast food” society. Most meals served to us have way too many calories that an average person can burn. They are empty calories that get stored as fat in our bellies and thighs. It has become a national health problem. I think people are in denial about their health, and as business provides the fashions that are more suited to younger, thinner people, what can you expect?

Mike, I was thinking of evidence in the legal sense that it would be something that could make one somewhat more likely to believe a particular point.  When you clarified that you meant evidence that would stand up to scientific scrutiny, I understood your point.

I understood further when you referred to the Bible as a book of mythology.  If you refer to it that way and do not believe it has any historical value, you are unlikely to believe anything else I could discuss is evidence.  (I believe your view puts you well outside the mainstream, but I will grant you that the mainstream is not always correct). 

One of the things that persuaded Jennifer to take another look at religion was the reasonable people she found who believed something she had thought to be unreasonable.  I believe you are reasonable.  I believe if you would look deeper, you would find there are reasonable people on the other side of this debate, as well. 

I wish you well.

Your article has some valid points but at the same time i don’t agree with the connections you make.
You seem to feel that that the oversexualisation/objectification of women is due to the introduction of contraception and started post 50’s era.
However,there is no evidence for this connection and the notion-popular in some Christian circles- that the 50’s or before women wern’t sexualised is a myth.
Women were just as sexualised in those days however the methods were different due to different levels of perceived “appropriateness” for different eras.
Sure,the 50’s had “wholesome” shows like Leave it to Beaver,but it was by no means limited to that.
These days/era,women are often hyper-sexualised by using nudity and overt suggestiveness(in ads or movies etc).
In the 40’s-50’s full sex scenes and nudity etc were a taboo,however women=sexobjects was done in other ways-eg:by the means of seduction etc.
If you watch movies from the 50’s you will notice that most of the roles for women were roles that equaled sex-object/seductress.
50’s movies are full of affairs,adultery,the suggestion of adultery,seduction etc…
For example the women character roles in James Bond movies,Marilyn Monroe type roles,...
While back then the nudity wasn’t there,the sexobject/sexappeal/woman as seductress etc still was.
The suggestion that in the 50’s women it was more focused for women to be beautiful rather the sexy is a myth or “seeing things through rose coloured glasses” (no offense).
The 50’s used sex/‘sex sells” just as much-but just in a different way which was “suited” to the 50’s era and social/relationship types.
50’s(or before) ‘icons’ like Marilyn,Sophia Loren,Jayne Mansfield,Bettie Page etc wern’t made that purely on their beauty(alhough they very often had that greatly too) but they were made that on their sexualness/SEXappeal.

mrsceecee-

If you read my other comments you will see that I said there is “no excuse to being over weight.” Why are you arguing with me?  I simply said that people who work in an office all day don’t have as many opportunities to move, which is true. No excuses, it’s just a fact. Do you really think an office worker moves just as much as someone in a field like construction, road workers, waitresses, mail carriers, lawn care workers, etc?  Yeah…..that’s the same as taking the stairs and walking farther in the parking lot and taking a walk during lunch. Yeah sure a construction worker going up and down ladders carrying a 5 gallon bucket of paint working in 95degree weather is the same as an office worker taking the stairs.

It does matter where you spend your day bc you have to compensate for that. My husband in construction never has to exercise.  Another man sitting in an office all day long would have to workout like a maniac to be in the same shape as my husband who moves 8 hours a day.
I have never been overweight, but I am glad I have the opportunity to move all day long so I don’t have to spend 2hrs at the gym every day and so I can eat dessert every single night.

From the New York Times;

—-
Human rights lawyers and victims of clergy sexual abuse filed a complaint on Tuesday urging the International Criminal Court in The Hague to investigate and prosecute Pope Benedict XVI and three top Vatican officials for crimes against humanity for what they described as abetting and covering up the rape and sexual assault of children by priests.

Of course that was in the Times. Now we will wait for all of their many articles exposing the (estimated to be far larger but less publicized and demonized) abuses in government schools and the prosecution of high level education bureaucrats including the head of the Dept of Education and perhaps HIS boss for those abuses.

What proof do you have of sexual abuse and protection of sexual predators in the Department of Education? Can you cite and article?
Otherwise you are just talking hot air.

POPE JOHN PAUL II SOLD CYANIDE-GAS TO NAZIS TO MURDER JEWS
The VaticanCrimes Organization has obtained shocking evidence documenting the employment history of Polish ex-cyanide gas salesman Karol Wojtyla - known worldwide as Pope John Paul II.
—-
In the 1940’s, the former salesman not only sold cyanide gas to the Nazis for use in Auschwitz concentration camps, but also worked as a chemist for I,G. Farben Chemical, the then largest chemical manufacturing enterprise in the world and the manufacturer of this poison gas. Yes, the very same poison used in conjunction with Malathion and Zyklon B by Nazi Germany to kill millions of Jews in the gas chambers of extermination camps, where they were burned to ashes in the ovens.
——
Benedict XVI as Cardinal Josef Ratzinger was the Head of the powerful Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from 1981-2005, with John Paul II the Great they both covered-up the pedophiliac holocaust committed by the JP2 Army John Paul II Pedophiles Rapists-Priests Army for over 24 years. History has proven that as Cardinal Ratzinger at the Vatican he aided and abetted the most heinous crimes against children together with John Paul II - both said nothing and did nothing to stop the JP2 Army

Read more: http://www.ncregister.com/blog/mark-shea/fool-says-in-his-heart-there-is-no-god/#ixzz1YH1oHWxx

Mary: are you sure you didn’t get that from the Onion?  You might want to choose your sources more carefully.

POPE JOHN PAUL II SOLD CYANIDE-GAS TO NAZIS TO MURDER JEWS
The VaticanCrimes Organization has obtained shocking evidence documenting the employment history of Polish ex-cyanide gas salesman Karol Wojtyla - known worldwide as Pope John Paul II.

*************************EVIL USE OF FICTION!!!***********************

http://liberalslikechrist.org/Catholic/popesnosaints.html
—-
http://liberalslikechrist.org/Catholic/popesnosaints.html#Benedict_XVI

http://vaticanassassinsarchive.com/THE_SALESMAN_AND_A_CHEMIST_WHO_BECAME_POPE.pdf
—

Contraception has allowed all women to be sexually available to all men, married or not, respect for human dignity optional. As with other behaviors and habits, take away the natural consequences, and you create a monster, and have to deal with unintended consequences. (...this is as true for contraceptive use as for pesticide use.)

It is not contraception per se, but its opposite, respect for the life giving power of sex, and of relationships that support families, that is the real topic here. This respect in and of itself prevents overpopulation. Think about it.

Thank you so much for writing this. It is brilliant. What the feminists thought would liberate us has caused pain for many generations to come.
God bless, Jen Morano

Society is always looking for excuses why we the people do negative things. The truth to the reason why we do things is because we do allow society to make our decisions for us. My belief is that keep God first and his plan. God showed me who I was at age 47,I’m the mother of three, ages 32-25 everybody thinking we are sister’s and brother especially with me weighing 115 pounds,makeup, wearing my three inch heels to work and my job is a hairstylist. I felt like my world had ended when my soulmate and I departed.God allowed me to see my inside(Thanking Jesus).I removed the makeup from my face and got more compliments without the makeup, then I did with the makeup. God allowed me to see my beauty he blessed me with.Society takes advantage of the decisions that you have to make for yourself, by putting more temptation in our lives then we can handle. Let God help you as he has helped me, and you will grow older and graciouly as I am doing at 52 looking, just as good,but most of all, feeling Blessed. Don’t get me wrong, all I’m saying is to be happy with yourself and God can give you that…B-Blessed!!

I’m amazed by seeing so many comments from readers of the National Catholic Register that Catholics are ignoring the teachings against contraception.  Isn’t this a conservative paper? Don’t you think you should obey the teachings of the Catholic Church if you read this paper?  My friends have as many babies as God wants them to have. You know, like it used to be before contraceptives. They believe in free love, free from chemicals, hormones, and barriers, love that is free to bring into being and love little babies. I saw a woman holding her eighth baby yesterday, and a few weeks ago I saw another woman holding her 16th baby surrounded by grown daughters, two of whom were pregnant. Those are satisfied women, much more satisfied than the contraceptors who have careers and have to spend their lives in jobs instead of in the fulfillment of motherhood.